Chapter Text
O, it is excellent
To have a giant's strength, but it is tyrannous
To use it like a giant
“Jay-Jay is in love~~”
He doesn’t bother to grant Roy’s sing-song tease his full attention by looking up.
“No I’m not.”
The redhead – one of the redheads, there are several of them in the room at the moment, because they are having a little bit of a basketball & nachos Sunday at the manor, a little for Wally’s benefit, largely because there is nothing else going on, to the point that the Justice League has decided to hold their first biannual maintenance meeting – pokes his chin into Jason’s right trap, irritating a fussy spot there. He shakes off both the attempt to read the half-obscured text messages through his tapping hand and the archer himself with a shoulder roll. “Back off, dude.”
Very characteristically, Roy does not back off. He does lean away a bit to work on another knot tucked into Jason’s shoulder blade though, so he allows the proximity. “That’s a lot of hearts,” he comments casually, fingers digging in nice and strong, callouses catching on the half-a-size-too-large pinstripe Gotham City jersey.
Jason throws him an annoyed glance. “Ever heard of privacy?”
His friend flashes him a grin that is all teeth and all Dick Grayson. He briefly wonders who’s rubbed off on who more, over the years. “You need to hang out with my brother less.”
Their corner of the room bubbles with a few light chortles and Jason gets the sneaky feeling that it’s somehow directed at him. A lightning-quick ruffling of his hair confirms that suspicion. Wally West snatches his hand away before anyone can break it, but there is no shielding against the glare Jason directs at the speedster’s words. “Don’t worry Jay, no one’s gonna steal big brother from you.”
“And while we are at it: no one’s gonna steal your dad either,” Roy adds, one sly eyebrow jerks up twice, miniscule movement attempting to fan the fire that doesn’t exist. It’s not even a timber because Jason doesn’t take the bait. Jason is going to stay cool and in control. “Whatever. I don’t even know what you guys are on about,” he tells the reds without looking up from his phone.
“Wally knows what I’m talking about,” Roy carries on. Jason ignores him because what are they, on a schoolyard? Oh I saw you hug your dad yesterday bwahahaha. No. Jason has nothing to be ashamed of. Jason is comfortable with his own emotional availability because he is a mature individual who –
“Because I told him how you cried last time I was here because Bruce wasn’t all about you for like, 30 minutes.”
Jason slams his phone down into the futon mattress and leaps at Roy.
They are still a tangle of limbs and stretched tops when Dick walks in with a little tray trolley of dippings.
“You didn’t see shit because you were so busy defiling our entryway rug!”
“I saw the way you stormed off like Amy March on her way to burn some book!”
“How dare you!” Jason strangles him. Just a little. And seethes, significantly more. “I am always Jo! Or at the very least Meg!”
Wally empties pot after pot of sauces into his bag of chips while keeping both eyes on the scene. “Should we stop them?”
Dick retrieves one miraculously half-full tzatziki from him and frowns. “I always thought I was Meg.”
The brawl escalates in both volume and intensity as it abruptly changes course.
“Dick told me Ollie had to bribe you with chili just to get you into the car!”
“Oh well Dick told me that you made Bruce drive to the Tricorner Yards at 5am!”
“Dick told me you wouldn’t let go of the portico column until Bruce walked with you!”
“Dick told me you wouldn’t let go of Bruce until he promised that he still likes you!”
By the second time his name comes up, Dick has wisely started wheeling the trolley out of the room with him but he’s still a step too late.
Dual pairs of green eyes snap towards him, and he lets out a nervous little chuckle. “OK so none of those were actually my exact words–”
Wally leisurely pulls the trolley out of their way.
“I just want to know,” Dick manages to get in five minutes into the row when both of Roy’s hands are fisted in Jason’s cloth and the latter is too busy establishing a leg lock. “What are we fighting about?” The leg lock is starting to look a little too established. “And maybe relax a little, Jay.”
Roy sends his enthusiastic agreement through a strained face. “You tell him, Dickie!”
“You could also try and let go of that top, man. Bruce probably won’t let us borrow his stuff for a week if you rip this one.”
Jason deflates like a stabbed balloon and drops Roy’s head just in time for him to cough out a series of laughter.
“Why,” his little brother complains, standing up with one hand extended to Roy, the other scrunching up the hem of, well, Bruce’s jersey to save the stretched material. The redhead pulls himself up with an arm wrapped around his middle, still laughing. Jason lets go and shoves him towards Dick. “You know what, you can get out of here now. And take Dickwad with you.”
Roy is practically howling at his scowl. “Aw. You are not fooling anyone, Jaybird. You’d rather I take off with your signed Knight’s baseball.”
Dick widens his eyes in delight, before Jason could shatter the illusion of him coming up above the Knight’s baseball on Jason Todd’s priority list. “Were you guys fighting over me?”
No reply from little brother, but his best friend (one of his best friends, he can have more than one best friend) snickers. “Ah, for starters. Then we really struck a nerve.”
“Roy called him a daddy’s boy,” Wally chips in, succinctly and very unhelpfully, earning himself a glare and thankfully, no leg lock. Jason huffs and puffs his way back to the futon and digs his phone out, going back to texting and pretending the tips of his ears are not turning a little redder than the initial result of his little tumbling around with Roy. Dick couldn’t help either the smile or the next words that have to come out. “Is he wrong though.”
“Shut up,” Jason tells the room at large, fingers a flurry of movement.
“Your dad is going to be heartbroken when he finds out about your hidden love interest,” Roy tells him from the safety of the furthest away window, hanging onto the top of the frame in a stretch. Two heads, one belonging to Stephanie Brown, who appears to have been dozing off until now, even through the loudest part of their roughhousing, turn at that. “Jason has a hidden love interest?”
“He does not,” Barbara says evenly, ending the discussion while earning an alarmed look from Jason. “You are not reading my text messages, are you?”
He receives no reply other than a mini basketball tossed to his face, having finally made its round through the room. Jason shoots it into the hoop without looking. “Y’all are so mean to me.”
Stephanie spreads out on the ground then arches her back until her feet are touching her crown. “Relax, dude. If Babs read your texts, do you think I’d ever let you hear the end of it?”
“I dunno, dude. Since I don’t keep anything incriminating–” Snorts from all directions. “–On my phone. Also I resent the implication that you guys are constantly sharing information about me.”
That earns him another string of giggles and an exchanged secret smile amongst the girls and their sun-spilled lounging area. Jason gasps.
“I knew it was you!”
“I didn’t want to interrupt because –”
“Oh you little shit! And I was like, listen there is one person in the entirety of Gotham City who wears that many purple accessories with that much blonde hair –”
“I’ll have you know that my aesthetic choices are –”
“Oh my god!” Dick explodes, unable to handle being excluded from the group gossip another second longer. “I’m going to start hacking into phones, you guys!”
“Steph saw Jason and Bruce at the mall the other day and she knew Bruce saw her too because they made solid eye contact across the courtyard but B pretended he didn’t because he, quote unquote, didn’t want to derail his one-on-one day with Jason. The end,” Barbara tells him.
Dick relaxes instantly. “Oh. Yeah. I remember that.”
“What the heck,” Jason exclaims. “Do you host tea parties to talk about me or something?”
Dick puts his hands up. “I’m so not touching that one. But no, I asked B if he can bring home some mochi that day and he said he’s staying at yours for dinner.” He opens up a fresh bag of flaming hot Doritos appeasingly. Jason huffs but grabs a handful.
“And Steph bought us all coffee for a month with the Starbucks gift card Bruce got her to buy her silence and his own clear conscience.” Barbara closes her book. “I’m going to go see if Cass is ready to leave, now that we’ve fulfilled the daily task of stirring up trouble and casting suspicion.”
Jason wipes off his Dorito fingers on Alfred the cat, fully intending to frame one of his siblings (or Steph. Actually, definitely Steph) later. He returns to texting with zeal and an eye-roll. “Great. I’ll let the old man know that he totally got ripped off.” He pauses and glances over with a frown. “Seriously though. Why didn’t you come over and say hi?”
Steph shrugs. “Because I was not invited and Bruce clearly does not enjoy my charming personality and unique brand of humor?”
The room erupts with taunting boos and uh-ohs. Roy leans over to high-five Steph. Jason, however, is the only silent and therefore possibly-taking-it-to heart one. Dick taps him on the shoulder with the Dorito bag. “Don’t worry about it, Jay. I’m sure Steph just hates you both.”
Jason levels him with an unimpressed look for the blatant way his brother just tried to signal Blondie. “The only thing more discordant than the color scheme of her outfits is your attempt at subtlety.”
Steph is deliberately aiming for his face with the basketball this time. “Don’t make me regret trying to be nice.”
“You didn’t even say hi to me! How’s that nice!”
Steph catches the wildly rule-breaking basketball header with her own forehead, completing their long-distance headbutt. “I knew Bruce’s mind would be going a lightyear a minute so I spared him the pain by ducking out, and later on guilted him into a lifelong supply of free coffee and pastries. Being nice to–” She bounces the ball up, once. “Others–” Twice. “To myself.” Thrice. She sends the basketball back. “Seriously though. I didn’t know how often you guys schedule this sort of things. Didn’t want to interrupt in case it was like, once a year.”
Jason swipes Alfred up and puppeteers him for a slam dunk. “It’s not scheduled–” Roy slithers over to intercept them and snorts. “It’s not scheduled!” He insists. Because it is not. What happened was that he was minding his own business in Water District and ran into Bruce who happened to be in the area for WE work. End of story.
OK so maybe what actually happened was that he was there to help an old friend from The Narrows with their tech rehearsal, and Bruce ditched half a dozen people and blew off work for the rest of the day to take a bus to town with Jason. They ended up spending the day together and actually caught a movie after the lack of encounter with Steph. But no one needs to know that. Especially not Roy, Mr. I-don’t-care-what-Ollie-says-I’m-just-going-to-cry-about-it-after-three-shots-of-scotch-and-five-beers.
Jason is not flapped. Jason is unflappable. But the trick to being unflappable is that the less people know about you, the less they have to use to flap you. He makes Alfred kick Roy in the chest and retreats to the futon when it’s become clear the goal is not gonna happen, not with him and Wally ganging up against them.
“I’m so glad he’s tall now,” the other redhead declares happily, the net visibly wearing off at the abuse of his super-speeded consecutive dunks. “I no longer feel any need to let him win these.”
“You have never let me win any of these.” “Careful, Wally. Bats gonna hunt you down if you make Jaybird cry.”
Says Jason flatly, and Roy, in the same second.
Sacred bond of what part of your friend’s ugly drunk cries should and should not be repeated to a roomful of people is very closely saved by the buzz of Jason’s phone. He flips off the small group of laughing dumbasses and pointedly stomps out to the hallway to answer the call.
“Are you already done with it?”
Tiny hairs on his neck tells him that no one is even trying to hide their eavesdropping.
He turns around to face grinning faces, finger still raised.
“Uh-huh. Yeah. No the game ended. I think. They didn’t really let me watch it. Pro– Yeah. Probably another hour, at least.”
He pauses.
“OK. I’ll ask. They might be heading out with– Right. OK. See you soon.”
He hangs up.
The grinning faces are pretty much unrelentingly deranged now. Jason searches the ceiling for his patience. “I do not have a hidden love interest!”
Dick eyes him with just a hint of suspicion, Jesus. “Is someone else coming over?”
He doesn’t know why he hesitates. “Uh, maybe?”
Eyebrows are raised in question and mouths begin opening to voice them, but deliverance comes in the form of his second shortest and current favorite sibling. Cass wraps both arms around his middle and stays there, so Jason marches them into the room loftily, conveying the “shut up” with an upturned nose.
They sit down together. He lets Cass mess with his hair and read his last few texts until Babs pokes her head in. “If anyone wants to raid any closet for any sleepover wear, now would be a good time.” She touches Dick’s hand. “Tell Bruce I said hi.”
The older boy creases his forehead. “What time is it? Shouldn’t he be back by now?”
Cass picks up Jason’s phone to type out a message. Jason himself remains silent and shrugs.
Steph rolls up. “Well. Tell the big guy I said hi. This time.” She avoids the leg Jason has suddenly stretched out to trip her over with a little hop and bends down for a half hug, stealing Cass in the process. Jason returns the hug but holds on to his sister. Their tug of Cass war eliciting some great delight from the girl and unsolicited amusement from the Reds.
“Jokes aside,” Roy observes. “You guys are the touchiest people I have ever met. And I’m not talking about Bat people. I mean like, people people.”
He is rewarded with the synchronized turn of five heads, different hair colors, the exact same muscle movement and ominous expression grinded in through years of practice. The archer draws in a sharp breath. “OK don’t do that?!”
“Argh,” Wally concurs.
They turn off their respective Bat glares and disburse. Steph rushing upstairs to track down a hoodie she will not find, Dick following the girls to the foyer, and Jason trailing behind to answer another call.
He’s having more and more difficulty shaking off the look of Roy’s narrowed eyes.
“You shouldn’t be on the phone while driving,” he says in lieu of “hello”, and raises a hand to wave at an empty-handed Steph who dives back in for another hug. Then Babs come back to give him a hug goodbye too. Then he hugs Cass again. And he accidentally hugs Dick because he sees the opportunity of a distracted Jason and decides to seize the opportunity. “They are actually leaving now, sorry. When you – Get off I don’t like you right n – No. Obviously I’m not talking to you. Someone just attacked– You know what I’ll just text you.”
And then, because he’s not going to not say it back for reasons such as being under the scrutiny of prying parties. “Love you too. Drive safe. Bye.”
“He does not have a hidden love interest!” Barbara yells before the front door shuts or anyone could say anything. Normally, that would have been the conclusive evidence, but unlucky for him, they are not discussing some perp’s motive for a double-homicide. Jason sighs as he awaits to be pounced on.
Roy hooks an arm over his shoulder. “You have been holding out on us!”
Jason sends his big brother a look from under his eyebrows and Roy’s sleeve and, yep, Dick’s got that little twitch in his jaw that says “I am trying to not expose myself with a more obvious tell of biting the inside of my mouth.” He’s not sure whether him being in the know is going to be a good thing or–
“Have I showed you guys my new favorite wallpaper?” Dick asks almost serenely. And Jason’s eyes blow wide open as he starts struggling against Roy with vigor. Dick’s phone is out of his pocket. Dick’s phone is on its way to meet Wally’s hand. Jason lets out a cry as he shoulder throws Roy to the ground – On one hand, it is hardwood. On the other hand, he really doesn’t care that much.
Sadly, he couldn’t catch up to an actual speedster. Wally grabs the phone and dashes away, gasps, dashes back, and thrusts the phone to a groaning Roy’s face. “Thisispreciousthisisadorablepalhaveyouseenthis.”
Roy breathes deeply to recover the wind that has been knocked out of him. “If this is not a picture of Jay and some girl, or guy! Then I don’t care,” and then he gasps too. “Oh wow!”
On Dick’s screen, there is a picture with Jason alright, but it is not Jason and some girl. Or guy. It is Jason with a bunch of them, all huddled together, Damian perched on top of his siblings victoriously, Tim a blur in the corner as a result of Steph shaking him by the neck, Cass holding one of her brothers with each arm, booping Dick and Jason’s noses together.
They are all wearing tops stolen from Bruce. An array of oversized (or slightly more fitted) hoodies and sweatshirts, and there is no doubt who’s taken this picture.
Jason lets out a relieved breath. It’s a nice picture. It’s also not the one he expected Dick to show them. Meanwhile, he is starting to feel slightly bad for chucking Roy to the floor.
“I have an album of those.” Two pairs of arms hold him back and away from clawing at Dick’s phone. “Here. This is the first one I took.”
Jason throws his hands up to the sky.
He knows the first picture in Dick’s Family hehe with a row of different colored hearts album. He is, to the surprise of no one, in that first picture.
He puts his hands down and over his ears to block out the ooohs and ahhhs.
“Actually,” Wally says with an air of epiphany, the why is beyond Jason. “This looks really familiar.”
Dick blinks at him. “Um. You do know two out of two people in this picture.”
Wally zooms to open the Youtube app on his own phone, and two seconds later, they are all dreamily staring at the video of a mother cat squashing her kitten with a fierce hug. Jason hopes the cuteness aggression hits them like an 18-wheeler and blow some veins.
“Play it again,” Dick demands, and Roy throws Wally’s phone away.
“Guys, the real golden material is,” he swipes back to the photo app on Dick’s phone. “This.”
The phone is tilted enough that Jason can only avoid looking at the picture if he turns his head away, which he refuses to do, because he is not embarrassed, either of the picture or what led to it. As a matter of fact –
“You told me to!” he accuses, pointing a finger at Dick as memories about that particular turn of events are jostled in his mind. “You were all like, Jason, Bruce’s in a bad place but he won’t admit it, and I know he’s going to keep making himself feel worse because he thinks he deserves it. And you made me do it!”
Well.
Sorta.
Dick probably meant that he should like, talk to Bruce, and not, ambush the guy and bully him into taking a nap in one of the coziest dens.
OH WELL SEMANTICS.
Plus, he has already paid the price. Exhibit A being the photo currently on display. Bruce really gets into a cuddly mode when he is freshly out of his “my kid died and came back” spiral. Whatever stiffness those backrubs worked off, Jason regained with a few bonus knots after spending hours being clutched like a huge plush toy. (He does feel for the kitten in the video)
(He’s also not complaining)
Some things in life are worth the crimps and creases.
Although the more imminent question is whether they are worth a future filled with Roy’s little jabs and teases.
His thigh tickles with another phone call and Jason gives up on his quest for the measly and faux sense of privacy and doesn’t bother to step out of the room. “Hi. What? No I’m not coughing I was just throwing hands with Roy. Of course I won. No it’s not. It’s because I thought I was going to have a cold– Anyway, sorry I didn’t– Oh you did! Nice. Yeah see you soon. Love you.”
He hangs up the phone. Dick smiles at him softly. Wally smiles at him softly. Roy is jumping up and down on the same spot. “I let you distract me with some wholesome pictures, but I want to go back to the juicy stuff now!” He grabs both of Jason’s shoulders and shakes him. “Our boy is in loooooove!”
Jason’s own voice comes out in a vibrated warble. “You are an idiot Roy.”